Stay Out! Stay Alive!
Near MissesIncidents that could have resulted in a fatality, but did not.

02/16/2009
A man was rescued yesterday evening from an abandoned stone quarry off Greenspring Avenue after he fell into the water and became stuck on an embankment, less than 6 feet from water estimated at 300 feet deep, authorities said.

The 19-year-old's name was not released, but police said he lived in the area. Officer Eli Visnick, of the Pikesville Precinct, said a resident of Quarry Lake at Greenspring, observed the male man climbing over a fence that surrounds the quarry about 5:30 p.m. and called police when he failed to reappear.

Visnick said the teen was up to his face in water while clinging to an embankment and about 50 to 60 feet from the top of the quarry when Visnick and Sgt. Blanca Ramirez entered the water and pulled him out. They then covered him with a blanket.

Visnick said the youth had trouble responding to him and Ramirez and had been in the water for about 15 minutes.

"If we hadn't been called, he would have slipped under the water and might never had been found," Visnick said. The water is the quarry is estimated to be 300 feet deep. He said the young man's cell phone was lying nearby.

Lt. Ronald Huber, of the fire station at Texas, said his station's urban search and rescue team and firefighters from Pikesville and Brooklandville responded and placed him the young man into a stokes basket while using ropes as rigging to steady the basket while making their way to the top.

Darkness had set in and the crew of a county police helicopter used its high intensity searchlight to illuminate the scene. At the top, the The teen was taken by ambulance to Sinai Hospital and treated for hypothermia, said Elise Armacost, a county Fire Department spokeswoman. She said the rescue was completed in about an hour.